(The caucus also invited a dozen or so science-leaning Twitter users, myself included, to good seats and a peek at some of the Library's artifacts, including one of Carl Sagan's slide rules.)

Tyson framed his talk around three things that motivate societies to tackle never-been-done-before efforts like the Pyramids, the Great Wall of China, Columbus' voyages, and the Apollo program. One of these three factors—praising royalty or a deity—doesn't apply in the US. A second—countering an existential threat, which Tyson called "the 'I don't want to die' driver"—has faded since the end of the Cold War.

That leaves the promise of economic return: in Tyson's words, "I don't want to die poor!"

"If you have a healthy science program in this country, you guarantee your economic future," he declared in one of the moments that could have been snipped from a campaign speech.

But with basic research, that payoff can come at a slow and unknowable pace.

In one case Tyson spelled out, the reward won't fit in a spreadsheet cell: the shift in our cultural consciousness will be forged by images like Apollo 8's Earthrise and other images of the lonely Earth floating in space.

Tyson criticized two recent examples of the United States pulling back from big science projects that might have had their own long-term payoff. One was the 1993 cancellation of the Superconducting Super Collider that, he said, could have discovered the Higgs Boson "on the first day." The other was the government balking at the Space Exploration Initiative NASA drew up for President George H.W. Bush, estimated to cost $500 billion over 20 to 30 years.

One area where Tyson did not nail his case was when he argued that non-government entities—a few of which aren’t quarterly-earnings obsessed corporations—will never back comparable efforts. He may feel that "private enterprise will never lead a space frontier," as he said during Q&A afterwards, but SpaceX founder Elon Musk seems quite serious about going to Mars.

He did, however, break out a prop to emphasize the relatively small amounts of money involved: a dollar bill from his wallet.

"You can take a dollar and cut off this edge but don't get into the ink," he said. "Then cut off the other edge and don't get into the ink. Those two amounts of this dollar, that's the R&D budget of the United States.

"The rest is everyone complaining that our economy is losing ground in the world."

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it? There was no, "the payoff will take decades" in that. Just, "we're going. Science, figure out how to get us there" and it happened. And so did all the technology that came out of it. Research for the sake of research is a hard sell. So you found the Higgs Boson? Great and what does that do for me today?

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

Tyson is a great evangelist for science. It would be awesome if pure research could get a shot in the arm from the government, now that investors will torpedo any corporate R&D with ROI that takes more than 20 minutes.

Sadly the right has managed to confuse and combine "any borrowing" with "investment that will pay off in the future" so it will just never happen.

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it? There was no, "the payoff will take decades" in that. Just, "we're going. Science, figure out how to get us there" and it happened. And so did all the technology that came out of it. Research for the sake of research is a hard sell. So you found the Higgs Boson? Great and what does that do for me today?

Figuring out how to go to the Moon was mostly a matter of Engineering, not Science. Also, the US went there because of politics, and science went into it after the politics were done and dusted. Of course, without politics, the money ran out pretty quickly.

I recently tweeted NASA, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and his Star Talk Radio show to see if there was something like "1% For The Planet", but for NASA. Apparently, NASA can't accept donations from the general public, they can only accept money from Congress due to a really old (and stupid IMO law).

If NASA had a Kickstarter for nearly anything, it would be funded ASAP. Such a shame that I can't help my favorite government agency.

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it? There was no, "the payoff will take decades" in that. Just, "we're going. Science, figure out how to get us there" and it happened. And so did all the technology that came out of it. Research for the sake of research is a hard sell. So you found the Higgs Boson? Great and what does that do for me today?

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

The lack of new antibiotics is mostly because we've spent most of the arrows that were on the quiver. Bacteria have developed resistance and it's getting harder and hard to find compounds that work on an angle (biological pathway/attack surface) that we haven't bred bacteria to survive already.

Now, if you compare malaria treatments and erectile dysfunction, I agree wholeheartedly.

I recently tweeted NASA, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and his Star Talk Radio show to see if there was something like "1% For The Planet", but for NASA. Apparently, NASA can't accept donations from the general public, they can only accept money from Congress due to a really old (and stupid IMO law).

If NASA had a Kickstarter for nearly anything, it would be funded ASAP. Such a shame that I can't help my favorite government agency.

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it? There was no, "the payoff will take decades" in that. Just, "we're going. Science, figure out how to get us there" and it happened. And so did all the technology that came out of it. Research for the sake of research is a hard sell. So you found the Higgs Boson? Great and what does that do for me today?

Your channeling of Cave Johnson is impeccable!

I assume you mean this guy:

Quote:

"All right, I've been thinking. When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back! Get mad! I don't want your damn lemons, what am I supposed to do with these? Demand to see life's manager! Make life rue the day it thought it could give Cave Johnson lemons! Do you know who I am? I'm the man who's gonna burn your house down! With the lemons! I'm gonna get my engineers to invent a combustible lemon that burns your house down!"―Cave Johnson

I recently tweeted NASA, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and his Star Talk Radio show to see if there was something like "1% For The Planet", but for NASA. Apparently, NASA can't accept donations from the general public, they can only accept money from Congress due to a really old (and stupid IMO law).

If NASA had a Kickstarter for nearly anything, it would be funded ASAP. Such a shame that I can't help my favorite government agency.

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

The lack of new antibiotics is mostly because we've spent most of the arrows that were on the quiver. Bacteria have developed resistance and it's getting harder and hard to find compounds that work on an angle (biological pathway/attack surface) that we haven't bred bacteria to survive already.

Now, if you compare malaria treatments and erectile dysfunction, I agree wholeheartedly.

While that is part of it, the importance of antibiotics to us should (in theory) be pushing the science, but it's not - and that is down to money. I found this interesting:

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it?

America did not make that decision, JFK made that decision.

Yes and then he got killed at the height of his popularity, before he had a chance to screw up big. His successors did not dare mess with his legacy. And so NASA was left alone by politicians for 10 years. In those 10 years they did their thing and landed on the moon 6 times.

Carter didn't know what to make of NASA and left them alone, and we got the Space Shuttle.

Every president since then has tampered with the core NASA programs. They'd cancel the projects started by their predecessors, and begin anew with their own vision for NASA. Only outlier science missions, such as Mars rovers, made it from approval and funding, to launch. Every long term manned exploration initiative, which takes considerably longer than 4 years, or even 8 if the pres is serving two terms, they've all been terminated and something else put in its place.

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

The lack of new antibiotics is mostly because we've spent most of the arrows that were on the quiver. Bacteria have developed resistance and it's getting harder and hard to find compounds that work on an angle (biological pathway/attack surface) that we haven't bred bacteria to survive already.

Now, if you compare malaria treatments and erectile dysfunction, I agree wholeheartedly.

Yes, which is why we should fight bacteria with benign bacteria, not with synthesized chemicals.

Probiotics > antibiotics

Obviously this isn't possible in every instance and for every infection.

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

The lack of new antibiotics is mostly because we've spent most of the arrows that were on the quiver. Bacteria have developed resistance and it's getting harder and hard to find compounds that work on an angle (biological pathway/attack surface) that we haven't bred bacteria to survive already.

Now, if you compare malaria treatments and erectile dysfunction, I agree wholeheartedly.

Yes, which is why we should fight bacteria with benign bacteria, not with synthesized chemicals.

Probiotics > antibiotics

Obviously this isn't possible in every instance and for every infection.

Probiotics may displace less desirable bacteria in the gut, but they won't protect you from food poisoning or any external infections. I think your inequality is inaccurate.

It's pretty obvious stuff. Of course we should be investing, heavily. The market is terrible at this kind of stuff - look at the lack of vital antibiotics verses the multiple ways for 60 year olds to get an erection.

The lack of new antibiotics is mostly because we've spent most of the arrows that were on the quiver. Bacteria have developed resistance and it's getting harder and hard to find compounds that work on an angle (biological pathway/attack surface) that we haven't bred bacteria to survive already.

I am aware of no relation between funding and results. There is lots of medical funding, I don't think this is the fundamental problem. WRT breeding bacteria to be resistant to the antibiotics we have now however, I quite agree. What the result of this in the future will be is unknown, but there's no way it can be good.

Quote:

Now, if you compare malaria treatments and erectile dysfunction, I agree wholeheartedly.

Viagra was an accident, it was designed as heart medication (look it up), not one penny was spent to find a cure erectile dysfunction. I don't see what this has to do with anything else.

It seems as though the vast majority of readers missed the point of Tyson's speech: An investment in science now makes possible the technological progress that keeps us ahead of other countries. Scientific investment, alongside basic educational investment, ensures future economic potential by giving more people a chance to contribute, who would otherwise become high school dropouts. This is what Politicians seem to have forgotten. If you slash and burn everything that doesn't have to do with military or social welfare, you end up with a country of poorly educated people who can't keep pace with countries like China who have a long-term plan to overtake the U.S. as the world's leading power. When that happens, it's not going to be good for us.

A black guy who's not an "alpha male" in the sense of A314InTheSky's original comment. That guy is the one whose power or ego you have to threaten to get him to agree to anything. i.e.; "In America, he's a white, 50+, gun carrying creationist head-of-household Republican."

*sigh* What happened to the America that said, "Fuck it, we're going to the moon!" and just went and did it? There was no, "the payoff will take decades" in that. Just, "we're going. Science, figure out how to get us there" and it happened. And so did all the technology that came out of it. Research for the sake of research is a hard sell. So you found the Higgs Boson? Great and what does that do for me today?

You were in a cold war, and the commies were winning the space race.

I couldn't find the video, but I remember seeing news footage of Americans being incensed Russia beat them to one of the milestones. I *think* it was when Yuri Gagarin became the first man in orbit. Their response was: "it should have been us!". Letting the commies continue winning the space race would have been politically untenable, not to mention a bad idea for the US (and the West in general).

Along the lines of what somebody else said: I don't think Western governments will seriously invest in space travel again until the Chinese start landing people on the Moon and/or Mars. Investing that sort of money doesn't appear as such a good idea until not investing in it seems like a worse one.

The corrupt politicians and the apathetic voters have made their choice: they would rather spend the money on pointless wars. They haven't the faintest idea as to how negative the repercussions will be.

If it's true that "non-government entities will never back comparable efforts", then that should tell you something.

If people don't want to put their resources for such projects (they prefer consumption or shorter-term or lower-risk research and development), then a representative government *should not* tax them to fund projects preferred by a few.

I disagree.By people you mean investors. The only entities capable of funding something like a moon landing are governments or a pool of wealthy investors. However, investors are for motivated by profits on their investments and are more interested in less risky short-term investments for a quick profit. Governments are not motivated by greed and can afford to invest decades into a project without immediate results.

If people don't want to put their resources for such projects (they prefer consumption or shorter-term or lower-risk research and development), then a representative government *should not* tax them to fund projects preferred by a few.

Yeah, I don't want my government making decisions about what's better for my countries future and then spending my tax money on it! Oh...wait...

One area where Tyson did not nail his case was when he argued that non-government entities—a few of which aren’t quarterly-earnings obsessed corporations—will never back comparable efforts. He may feel that "private enterprise will never lead a space frontier," as he said during Q&A afterwards, but SpaceX founder Elon Musk seems quite serious about going to Mars.

I still think Tyson is correct here. If SpaceX goes to Mars, it’s because NASA has already collected considerable data and quantified the risks. I doubt SpaceX would spend the resources building and launching probes just for informational purposes.